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WOMAN'S INTERNATIONAL LEAGUE 
LECTURE BY 
DR. GiORGE W, NASMYTH 
APRIL ete. L919 4; 


SUBJECT: Territorial Adjustments, 


The problem we are going to study this evening is Terri- 
torial Adjustments, and I brought with me a very intd@resting map, and 
in these little pamphiets which you can get at cost from the World 
Peace Foundation, I think, at five cents a piece, - at 40 Mt. Vernon 
Street, Boston, Mass,, there is a small reproduction of this map in 
the back, 

We have been accustomed to looking at war maps which change 
from day to day, This is a different kind of a map, a map which never 
changes - at least, it changes very slowly in the course of generation: 
and centuries, because it.is a map of nationality, And whatever 
settlement of the problems comes out of the peace conférence, this 
. map will have ‘to be the basis of the future world, That is, if you 
nave a League of Nations on the one hand composed of the present 
covernments, they will have to find some way of adjusting problems 
between the Poles and the Czecho-Slovaks - between the Poles and the 
Ukrainians - and all the other problems of that kind. 


If, on the other hand, the revolution sweeps on from Russia 
and Hungary into Austria and Germany and on from there into Italy, 
Spain and France, and possibly England, and we have a socialist Europe, 
still these problems of territorial adjustment will have to be worked 
Out - some solution will have to be found, 

. , 9 

So that the things which we shall discuss tonight are 
fundamental problems of international co-operation, irrespective of 
what kind of a settlement comes out of the Peace Conference. 


Since the Armistice was signed on November 11th, sixteen 
wars have broken out in Europe, (laughter) and they are mostly over 
questions of territorial adjustment, and I want to discuss with you 
five fundamental tcrinciples of territorial adjustments taking con- 
crete illustrations from this map. Notice that this map disregards 
political boundaries, You cannot tell by looking at it where any 
state begins or ends unless you look ratner closely. You can find 
the cld poundary of Germahy running around here and the boundary of 
Austria running around there, and the old bountary of Russia running 
around there, (sveaker following locations on the map) Poland is 
divided into three parts. But on this map the thing that stands out 
is this yellow area of Poland, It is as if there had never been a 
partition, and if you study the realities instead of the fictions of 
governments and political organizations, there has never been a parti- 
tion of Poland of course, The Polish nationality is in existence, - 
is stronger - is more determined to achieve its freedom, than it 
was 150 years ago at the time of the partition. 


And so with this island nationality of the Eohemians and 
Moravians and Czecho-Slovak nation. Here this yellow region is the 
Hungarians, Here is the great Jugo-Slav nation, consisting of Serbia, 
Uroatia, Dalmatia and Bosnia, and here is hontenegro. Here are the 
Bulgarians, This brown is the Greeks, and you will notice that 
the islands all through this region and the coastal areas along Asia 
iinor here are also brown, The Greeks were great coast colonizers, 


In the middle here between Bulgaria and Serbia is a red 
portion of liacedonia in dispyte, although it is pretty generally 
agreed, or was at least before the war, that Macedonia is Bulgarian,- 
on the principle of self-determination. We had a congress in Chicago 
of 50,000 liacedonians the year before the war, and they voted unani- 
mougly in favor of annexation to Bulgaria, Then up here oome the 
Baltic provinces - Lithuania, “sthonia, and Livonia. Here is Finland, 


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and Russia is shown here as one color, although the divisions are 
indicated - the Great Russians here, the White Russians here and 
the Little Russians or Ukrainians in the south, bordering on the 
Black Sea. This green portion is the truly Turkish portion of the 
Ottoman Empire arid Aetolia. Here are the Armenians extending down 
into the Mesopotamian Valley; here are the Syrians and people of 
Palestine on the eastern coast of the Mediterranean. 


Now the first principle that stands out if we are to have 
a Hurope at peace in the future, is the principle of nationality - 
the attempt to deny that principle, - the frustration of the as- 
piration towards unity of those people who have a common spirit, - 
because that is after all what nationality comes back to. It isn't 
altogether language; it isn't altogether geographical propinquity. 
In the case of Switzerland, for example, you have French and German 
and Italians forming one nationality, because of a common history 
and @ common tradition and a common culture and common ideals. It 
is a spiritual thing, and the attempt to deny the aspirations of 
nationality by the opposing principle of imperialism has led to 
much of the suffering and horror through which Europe has passed 
during the past century. 


So that if we are to have a Hurope at peace in the future, 
the principle of nationality must be taken as a fundamental prin- 
ciple of settlement. That gives us some interesting results. It 
means that Alsace Lorraine will be annexed to France; it means that 
the partition of Poland will be undone, and it is interesting to 
note that there is a tongue of yellow area here - Polish inhabited 
area - going up to the Baltic sea, just west of the Gulf of Danzig - 
not the city of Danzig itself which has .a majority of Germans in its 
population, but just. west is a tongue,@adcuriously enough if you 
were close enough you couid see a thin yellow line of Polish immi- 
gration stretching clear across Germany here. They have followed a 
family line of migration apparently, and there is a stream of 
Polish villages and towns straight across marking a migratory ven- 
ture some time in the past. It means that we shall have the new 
Czecho-Slovak nation here, the new Jugo-Slav nation here, which has 
already been recognized... It means that there will be a greater 
Roumania here including this portion of the former Hungarian King- 
dom - Transylvania, west of the mountains here, and also this rich 
portion of what was Russia - Bessarabia, taken from the Turks and 
held by Russia ever since the war of 1877. 


If then we take the principle of self-determination -O& the 
wishes of the peoples themselves as the fundamental principle in 
territorial adjustment, - in redrawing the map of Europe, we come 
immediately upon a second problem, and that is the rights of minor- 
ities. If you look, for example, at this new Roumania which is in 
process of being created, you will find that right in the center 
of it is a yellow resion of Hungarians - Magars - so that if you 
think of Transylvania as being an Irish problem you will find that 
it has also its Uister problem, and one of the main reasons on 
which the Hungarians have objected to a settlement of the Tran+~- 
sylvanian problem has been that the major minority there would be 
oppresséd. It shows particularly in the case of Transylvania - 
this: Hungarian minority = but 2t. issequally true in ail ‘of these 
areas. . 


For example, this Armenian area here in yellow, which 
shows as one solid block, has scattered through it little groups 
of Kurds and of Turks and.of Gréeks, a@nd.so in all of these other 
areas you have also the problem of a minority when you try to settle 
the territorial adjustment on the basis of self-determination. 


Now what is the matter in Ulster? The minority is claiming 
the. right to place an absolute veto upon the rights of the Irish to 
self-determination. That is clearly an impossible position to ttake, 
and if the minorities are to have the right of veto on any change 
through here, there is no hope for any settlement of the future 
map of Zurope on a basis of permanent peace. 


The thing which minorities ought to have is guarantees 
and protection - the right to sveak their own language - to have 
their own religion - to have their own educational systems, schools 
and universities - to develop their own culture, The rights of 


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minorities ought to be protected and guaranteed. But minorities 

in Ulster -or Transylvania or anywhere else ogght not to have the yj 
veto over the vrinciple ot self-determination. That is the second % 
principle that must be recognized whether we have a Rolshevist 
surope or a capitalist League of Nations Europe, - boundaries 

have got to be settled first on the principle of nationality, and 


Secondly the rights of minorities within those i ,+4 2 
got to be safeguarded. nationalities have 


The third principle comes out when you study a ro) 
like that of Trieste, or Fiume, or Salonica ee Ke pae Lc Eneiae 
seaports - because all of these nationalities must have access to 
the seas. The high sea is the great highway of the world's 
commerce, and in these days of the division of labor and inter-: 
national exchange of products, a nation which is cut off from 
access to the sea, is condemned toa very low degree of economic 
life and vo pretty severe suffering. The cutting off of Serbia 
from her little window on the Adriatic was the cause of the second 
Balkan war, and that led in part to the third Balkan war, which is 
this great European conflagration, ; 


Now, take the city of Trieste, for example, - the majority 
of the people of Triette are Italian - sneak the Italian language 
and wish to belong to Italy, and Trieste goes to Italy under the 
principle of nationality. But the prosperity of Trieste depends 
upon this great Hinterland, It is the seaport for the industrial 
regions of Bohemia and all of this region of Austria lying in here, 
and if Trieste is merely annexed to Italy and included in the 
italian tariff wall, cut off from the Hinterland upon which its 
prosperity depends, the same thing will heppen to Trieste as 
happened to Salonica after the second Balkan war, ~  .- sepkis. 
nia : Salonica was annexed to Greece because the 
majority of its people were Greek, but the prosperity of Salonica 
depended upon all this Macedonian region, and this Balkan Hinter- 
land, and when Salonica was annexed to Greece and the Greek tariff 
wall was -put around her and she was cut off from that Hinterland 
upon which her prosperity depended, her people starved to death. 
Her population was reduced to less than one-haft? in the course of 
two years, and the same thing would happen to Trieste and to 
Fiume and to these other seaport towns if the principle of nation-~ 
ality were allowed to rule alone, 


So that not only have we got to add the principle of the 
safeguarding the rights of minorities to the principle of nation- 
ality - we have to add-also the principle of economic relations - 
of access to the sea - of internationalizing seaports whose pros- 
perity depends upon a Hinterland of different nationality. In the 
case of Fiume and these other ports we heve a very difficult com- 
plication of nationality with economic and military considerations. 
Italy claims not only Trieste which is Italian in population, hut 4 
and @1so Apalato and Durazzo, and the other seaports of the Jugo- 
Slav nation. The commercial rivalry between Trieste and Fiume 


and Spalato and Durazzo and these other ports is very keen and the 


tendency would undoubtedly be to hinder the development of these 
seaports, - to make more of the commerce flow through Trieste - 

to give Trieste an advantage over Fiume and the other ports there,-- 
if Italy were able to control the flow of commerce through them. 


So that not only da you have these strategic and military 
considerations which Italy is urging as the ground for her annex- 
ation of Dalmatia, but you have also these economic rivalries be- 
tween the different seaports end the principle of nationality. 


If then we look at a nation like this @gecho-S$lovak nation- 
an island nationality - we find that another principle must be 
taken into consideration, and that is economic interdependence, 


A Qzecho-Slovak nation without access to the sea, without 
some kind of an international highway here, or a Poland without 
an access to the sea here, - would have a very difficuit time to 
survive, and would probably find its economic existence impossible. 
Not only that, but this whole Balkan region is an example of some- 
thing ‘that applies on a larger scale all through the map. This 
whole valley of the Danube here between the Carpathian mountains 


¢ also Fiume which is more largely Slavie population, 


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On the north, and the Dalmatian mountains on the south-west, is one 
eoonomic unit, and the attempt to split that up into separate 
nationalities, - let each one have its own tariff walls, its own 
army and navy, and its own diplomatic service and all the rest of 

it, - would simply result in a chaos there, It would be the Balkan 
anarchy that we have had diwing the past half century and a seat of 
constant wars - tariff wars - boundary wars - racial wars - extermin- 
ations - massacres, and all sorts of troubles of that kind. 


So that nationality is evidently not the last word in the 
Solution of international problems, It is a force which must be 
recognized; the attempt to frustrate it in the past, to oppose to 
it the reactionary principle of imperialism - has had two evils in 
its effect. One is to make these nations bristle with resentment 
and over-emphasize their nationalitiistic characteristics. Masserick 
and Paderewski and the other representatives of these nationalities 
down through here, are extreme examples of nationalistic feeling, 
On the other hand the curse of imperialism, of course, has reflected 
back into the social structure of the nations which exercised it. 
You will find in America ths men who have been the governors of 
the Philippines upholding the doctrine that might makes right, and 
our social] structyre as well as thé social structure of all the 
countries of Europe are distorted by imperialism. That is not only 
an evil for the countries which suffer in this frustration of their 
nationalistic aspirations, but an evil for the nations which impose 
imperialism on the others. | | 


However, after you have recognized the irresistible forde 
of nationality, you have to add to it all these other consideratioms, 
First that of toleration of the rights of minorities; secondly, of 
international free cities and access to the seas; thirdly, of 
economic invercourse, interdependence, and freedom of trade - is 
what it comes to finally; - and lastly, nationality is something 
which should be recognized only because it is the necessary step 
through which we must go on the way to world federation. 


Now those principles are fundamental principles, as I say, 
whether we are to have a Rolshevist Europe or a concert of powers 
or League of Nations Europe. . 


We have all these sixteen wars going on at the present time 
over questions of boundaries, questions of nationality, questions 
of the rights of minorities; - ahd that question of the rights of 
minorities always gets mixed up with the social conflict. The Jews, 
for example, are persecuted and massacred and oppressed in Roumania, 
in Poland, in Russia, under the old regime, ~- not only on account 
of religious prejudices, but more largely usually because the Jews 
are the leaders in thought, are the most radical groups in the pop- 
ulation, are socialistic and advance in their social and political 
thinking, and 30 you have had the persecution of minorities merging 
into a class war, and the Austro-Hungarian Dmpire has been a storm 
center of Europe because it was split one way by divisions of nation- 
ality and spiit the other wey by divisions of social philosophy and 
class war, and ‘witn that double splitting of the Austro-Hungarian 
Hmpire ho democracy could davelop. uliititariem was enthronsd. The 
powere of imporialism-could set off one cluss group ageinst the other, 
and keeping these groups fighting among themselves were able to pre- 
vont the development of any democratic forces and to maintain their 
power of militarism and of imverialism supreme, 


So that whetever the structure we hope to build in Europe 
for the future, the foundations must be laid upon principles of 
justice - upon principles of sclf-determination of the people with 
the rights of minorities safcpuarded, - with access to the sea 
for 211 these industrial and agricultural regions, + with freedom 
of economic intercourse, - and with the principle of federation, 
free, voluntary co-operation and federation, replacing the old 
principle of imperialism imposed by force. 


There was a certain justification, I suppose, in the saying 
attributed to Bismarck that if thrre® were no Austro-Hungérian Empire 
one would have to be created. The basis of that is the economic 

unity which exists in all this region of the Danube Valley, and 


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in truth in all this region of Hurope and of all the world. The : 
world has become economically interdependent, and an attempt to isolate 
nationalities, build up tariff walls or military walls or national 
walls of various kinds, is Simply placing obstacles in the way of 
irresistible forces, and reculte in friction and explosions, 


This Armenian problem is a rather interesting one. I think 
this map is somewhat favorable to the Armenians, because some OL’ 
these regions that are colored yellow do not have a majority of 
\rmenian population. What they do have is a larger minority, - a 
larger vercentage of Armenians than any other. Some of these cities, 
"or example, have forty percent of Armenians, and thirty percent of 
iurka, and twenty percent of Kurds, and ten percent of Greeks, The 
arpmenians are not a majority, but they are the largest minority, and 


if you take that as a basis not oe ee for absolute majorities 
vhere they do not exist, you find that the natural boundaries of 
sPmenia would reach down to the Nediterranean Sea at Alexandria here, 


a port near Adana (?), and would reach almost up to the Black Sea 
at Trebezond, and almost over to the Caspian Sea in the northern 
purt of Persia, 


| Then Russia is a most interesting study. The Georgians, 
Caucasians and Tartars, ané@ all of these different groups in through 
here, I suppose they really ought to be colored differently - the 
JUXrainians- and the White Russians and the Great Russians there. 
Russia was really an artificial grouping of nationalities held to- 
gether by the pressure of outside Military force and imperialism, as 
was the Austro-Hungarian Empire, and the present development on the 
basis of free federation and co-operation of the peoples solves what 
would otherwise have been 4 very dangerous problem, In other words, 
if the Russian Empire had continued as it was before the war, the 
national aspirations which were suppressed there would in the next 
few years have become irresistible in their force as they became in 
the Austria-Hungarian Empire and resulted in another war. 


There is an interesting illustration in the case of Relgium 
of the interplay of these forces of nationality, economic pressure 
434 social cleavage, In the north are the Flemish who speak a language 
very closely allied to the Dutch and are Protestant, In the south are 
5a@ Waloons who speak French and are Ronan Catholic, as are the major~ 
ity of the French people. During the German occupation of Belgium, 
“he Germans tried very hard to conciliate the Flemish part of the 

‘opulation, claiming that they were part of the Germanic race, etc., 

id succeeded far enough so as to bring the #lemish under very grave 
“iSpieion on the part of the Waloons. That situation was further 
omplicated by the fact that the Flemish are more radical in their 
views, The conservative Roman Catholic party of Belgium springs very 
largely from this Waloon region here, whereas the radical socialistic 
forces come from the Flemish portions, so that in the struggle of 
those two groups for the domination over the Belgium of the future, 
séch of them has put forward and exaggerated claims, and you find the 
eather astounding spectacle of Belgium who is protesting against 
imperialism and annexation now putting forward two claims - the Flemish 
part claiming Linburg and®?part of Holland, the Waloon part attempting 
tO annex Luxemburg and a part of Germany, - each of them trying to add 
area to its power as the north and south tried in trying to annex 
+8xas and Kansas and Nebraska, etc,, the Slave-owning part trying 
to get additional territory and population and power, and the non-slave 
1olding part trying to gain power on its side, That same kind of a 
conflict is going on here in these rival annexation claims of Belgiun, 


This map shows very clearly that there is no basis whatever 
“or the French claim for the annexation of the left bank of the Rhine, 
‘<re is the linguistic boundary of France. It runs about half way 
hrough Alsate-Lorraine, and in giving all of Alsace-Lorraine to 
rance the Peace Conference “rould be giving a large German speaking 
section, Strassburg and cities like that. Nevertheless that German 
peaking section “of Alsace-Lorraine is very largely French in thought 
‘nd in feeling. The ideas of the French revolution and the doctrines 
of the rights of man have been cherished by the people of Alsace- 
orraine especially during this period of forty-four years while they 
‘are merely a Reichsland of Prussia - a country without any constitution: 
-l rights, a country held merely by military conquest, They went back 


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always to the ideas of the republican government and the French re- 


volution, and kept their French thoughts and philosophy even though 
@ large part of them spoke German, ; 


This region, however, which the extremists in France de- 
mand up to the left bank of the Rhine, is purely German in its 
philosophy as well as its language and political preference; and 
the Saar Valley in here, which France claims for various grounds, 
the latest ground being because of the value in coal mines and her 
need for coal mines, is itself intensely German in feeling and desire. 


I said in the beginning that in contrast to the war maps 
that we have been watching and moving the battle line upon, this is 
& map which never changes. As a matter of fact it does change slowly, 
and it is interesting to Study the reasons for those changes. For 
example, the French language area has encroached on the German language 
area in Switzerland and in other parts of the map, and that is because 
of the greater charm of the ideas which the French language held, 
People who were filled with idealism for the principles of democracy 
and wanted to study the works of Voltaire and so on were forces which 
kept this French language boundary creeping eastward, The charm of 
the philosophy and ideals and literature of the French language kept 


displacing the French boundary against all the propaganda and methods 
of force that Germany could use.. 


Avery interesting contest went on in the case of Poland 
and in the case of Bohemia, where every effort was made in the case 
of Poland to Russianize the large portion that belonged to Russia 
and to Prussianize the portion that belonged to Prussia. They even 
went to the extent of buying up land from the Poles and giving that 
land at very low rates to German colonists and planting them in 
there in the hope that they would increase and muitiply and finally 
make that into a German area, but they were inevitably wiped out. 
They could not compete with the Poles in their agricultural methods, 
and in their standard of living, etc., and after a-few years they 
would give up the struggle and have to move out. In the case of 
Sohemia some very. interesting conflicts went on. The Bohemians were 
forbidden by the Germans - the German minotity which dominated 
austria - to use their own language, and for a long time a number 
of these Slavic peoples were forbidden to have universities and 
educational systems, etc., forbidden to have schools of their own 
language. The result was that their children grew up in ignorance; 
they refused to send them to German schools and they had no schools 
of their own to send them to and so they grew up as an illiterate 
population, But as the birthrate of the highly educated German pop- 
ulation kept dropping off - they had families of only two or three- 
these illiterate Poles and Bohemians and other Slavic peoples had 
large families - of sometimes 20 or 23 children - and so the boundaries 
of nationality kept encroaching in spite of all the methods of force 
and militarism and external pressure that could be used. The boundar- 
ies of these Polish and Bohemian nationalities kept encroaching 
steadily on the Germans and on the Russians and on the others that . 
were trying to persecute them. So that you have some very -nter- 
esting examples of the futility of force to affect irresistible motives 
like those which dominate netionality, - in this case the charm of 
the French language, - in this case racial and cultural factors 
scattered all over this map. 

I want to leave as muoh time as possible for questions and 
discussion of this very interesting problem, and I think perhaps we 
might oven that part of the session now, I simply want to sum: up 
these five principles, which, as I say, must underlie the peace of 
the world in the future, imo matter what kind of a social structure 
oversvreads Hurope. Even in these parts which are Bolshevist you 
have contlicts of nationality, and territory, etc., -going on, so that 
even if we have a Hurope which is entirely socialistic, we shall 
have to build upon the principlés of self-determination, the wishes 
of the people themselves concerned, which is the principle of nation-~ 
ality; secondly, toleration for the rights of minorities; thirdly, 
access to the sea and the great international highways; forrthly, 
economic interdependence; and fifth, the principle of federation, 
and the freer and more complete that federation, with of course 
free trade and its fundamentals, the more secure and stable the 
future peace of the world will be, 


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Now who would like to alex the first questidn on this 
intensely interesting subject? j 


QUESTION - Won't you say something about the Danzig 
Situation. 


DR, NASLYTH - This Polish tongue of land which runs up 
here is just west of the Gulf of Danzig but does not touch the 
city of Danzig, The majority of the peopte of Danzig are Germans 
although there is an area just west of the City of Danzig in which 
the majority pf the people are Polish. The difficulty there is that 
if you give this tongue of land to Poland it cuts these German, 
people in two. It separates Konigsbureg and this intensely loyal 
part of Prussia from the western part of Prussia, so that the 
solution evidently is to make Danzig & free port, a free internation 
al city, where the east and west and north and south routes can 
cross without putting obstacles in the way of either. 


QUESTION - What about a statement that I saw that some 
German statesman had made that the allies had chosen one out of six 
different methods of giving Poland an outlet to the sea - do you 
know the six methods? ; 


DR. NASMYTH - Well, there are other cities up here- 
Konigsburg, etc. There are railways that run up here that could 
be internationalized -- 


QUESTION - Do you know if there has been any other 
definite suggestion? 


DR. NASIYTH ~ No, I don't. It would be a pretty long 
route dovwm to the Adriatic Sea. 


QUESTION - What would it be like if they ran a route up 
at the extreme right? 


DR. NASYYTH - That would be up to honigsburg here. It 
is more intensely German here; there is a tongue of Polish land 
that runs up here, 


QUESTION - Is there any harbor there on that little 
tongue? | 


DR, NASMYTH - No, the harbor is down in the bottom 
of that bay. The most interesting problem of all is the future of 
Constantinople. I haven't said very much about that, but Con- 
stantinople is going to be one of the greatest cities in the world, 
Let me show you why. Here is the Rhine river running up to here, 
connected by a canal with the Danube, and the Danube runs down here 
to the Black Sea, and then comes this chain of.rivers down here,- 
the Tigris and Buphrates rivers running down to the Persian Gulf, 
and beyond this map the Ganges River runs up into India, connect- ° 
ing with the great rivers of China. Now these rivers aren't of se 
much importance, but the railroads which run along the river valleys 
are the important features, and here you have the great highway of 
the land route of the world connecting the 300,000,000 people of 
India and the 490,000,000 people of China - great nations just 
coming into the economic and industrial life of the world - with 
these 300,000,000 people of the highly industrialized western 
civilizations. You can imagine what a tremendous stream of com- 
merce ig, going to flow through Constantinople over the land route. 


On the other hand, Constantinople is the crossroads 
of this water route, which connects this wonderful agriculture 
region, the granary of Odessa and Ukraine and southern Russia 
and out through the Black Sea, all this area of Roumania, etc., 
and the immense wealth of these mountains over here ~- the Cau- 
casus. All of that flows through the water route out into the 
Mediterranean and through the Atlantic and Red Sea into the 
Indian Ocean. Constantinople is the cross-roads of this great 
water-route, and this great land route is one of the great 
Puture cities of the world. If you compare it with London, whida 
has some forty million people back of it as its greatest seaport, 
or New York which has its hundred million people back of it as 


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the main seaport for that hundred million people, - compare that 
with Constantinople which has these three hundred million people 
here with such differences of civilization trying to get together, 
you can see the possible glory of the future of the City of 
Constantinople there under an international government, 


If Constantinople belonged to the land powers, - belonged 
to Germany under this Bagdad Berlin railroad scheme, then there 
would be no outlet of the water route, and there would be another 
war. If, as the secret treaty provided, Constantinople went to 
Russia and Russia was in the position to block the land route in 
favor of her water route, there would be another war. The only 
Solution of that, of course, is to make Constantinople a free 
city under international control, and if that is dme if will be- 
come one of the great cities of the world in the future. 


QUESTION - You spoke a few minutes ago about its being 
necessary for Poland, and I suppose Czecho-Slovak to have an outlet 
to the sea for its economic prosperity. Now that presupposes, 
doesn't it, that the economic barriers should be kept out? Now if 
the League of Nations should take Wilson's fourteen points liter- - 
ally and remove economic barriers wouldn't Poland be all right 
even without internationalizing Danzig? 


DR. NASMYTH - With free trade through there - that is the 
only solution. The future existence, not only prosperity but 
existence, of these nations depends upon a real process of federatioi 


QUESTION - But if we have free trade we don't need that 
Outlet to the sea do we? 


DR. NASIIYTH - No, that is outlet to the sea, 


QUESTION - Do you think that Poland will go Bolshevik if 
it doesn't get its tongue of land? 


DR, NASMIYTH - No, it isn't the failure of the annexation 
policy that produces Bolshevism; it is starvation and lack of raw 
materials and failure to give them assurance of permanent peace 
and essential justice. Orlando and Sonino are threatening that if 
Italy doesn’t get Dalmatia and Fiume there will be a revolution, 
The truth is that if Dalmatia and Fiume are granted to Italy, and 
the whole settlement is made on the basis of imperialistic annex- 
ations so that these people who have gone through 211 the suffer- 
ing and horror face in the future simply new wars inevitably, then 
as the forces of Italy very clearly indicate there will be an 
explosion in Italy. It is failure to have enough statesmanship to 
settle these problems on a basis of justice and permanent peace 
which lead3 to policies of despair and extremism, 


QUESTION - The practical question comes up naturally - 
how are we going to get the kind of statesmanship that will lead 
to these things? Is there any chance at all for getting any of 
them? When you mention those excéllent things that should be, and 
when you think of the Peace Conference at present we feel as if you 
were-talking about the Millenium. Is there any connection at all 
between the present and that? 


DR. NASIIYTH - Wéll, the further the Peace Gonference 
goes the more we despair of it, I think. On the other hand, what 
I have been trying to point out are the fundamental principles upon 
which these problems must be settled in the end. I am pointing 
then out in this way. I believe that if there is such a bank- 
ruptcy of statesmanship as to sinply make an imperialistic peace 
of egnnexations, then the people will take power into their own hands, 
and when they do that they heve got to come back to these funda- 
mental principles that we have been discussing here, because they 
‘i411 be faced with the same problems themselves - problems of rights 

of minorities and federation and economic interchange, etc, 


QUESTION - Can you tell us about any of those definite 
ey2etions that have been taken up - have any of them been taken up 
in thet soirit at all by the Peace Conference, do you know? 


: Sate 


-9- 


* hie DR. NASMYTH - Well, the great deadlock that is coing o 
now 18 over the City of Fiume and Dalmatia’ on the part of the rimiiane 
the Saar Valley and guarantees on the lft bank of the Rhine on the 
part of the French, Lloyd George and Wilson see the red spector 
outside the windows of the Peace Conference and are. Standing against 
annexations there. Italy is standing very determinedly for those 
annexations, and France for those annexations. The deadlock is 
G0ing on now and is an indication that those facts are being con- 


Sidered and apparently a position of ; ; : 
for them, Mae fs f great tenacity is being held 


: QUESTION - Do you think there is any prospect of Con- 
stantinople, for instance, being made a genuine free port under inter- 
national control? The mandatory idea which seems the nearest thing 
to it in the draft doesn't seem to promise anything. 


DR, NASMYTH - I should have to. know a good deal more 
about the psychology of the different persons in the Peace Conference 


and the relative strength of the forces that are contending there to 
be able to answer that question, 


Suggestion? QUESTIG:But you don't think there has been any definite 


DR. NASMYTH - Yes, I think that the statesmen in the 
conference recognize that. The best book written on the subject 
is by L.S, Woolf on the Future of Constantinople, in which he 
traces the history of the International Commission which has regue 
lated the commerce off the Danube and shows how that would be applied 
in the case of Constantinople and how perfectly it would work. 


QUESTION - Has Woolf any power in the Peace Conference? 


DR. NASMYTH + Well, Woolf is the man who wrote the 
Fabian Society's book on International Government which has been in- 
corporated pretty largely into this plan for the League of Nations. 
He is a very sane and practical man andeurges there that that is 
the only solution; that if other solutions are tried they will break 
down and they will have to come finally to that solution, Constanti- 
nople has a wonderfully interesting population, of course, = a very 
Strong minority of Greeks, a considerable proportion of Bulgarians, > 
Turks and other nationalities of that kind, - so that you could 
foman international cemmission out of the populations of the city 
itself, It is sort of an international Soviet form of commission 
government, and you would have to join with that, of course, some 
disinterested powers, 


The interesting thing that Woolf points out in his 
International Commission of the Danube is the wrong kind and the right © 
kind of international commissions. There was a temporary commission 
With representatives fron ali the EHuropean nations which was to have 
very limited powers and last only two years, There was a permanent 

commission camposed of the representatives of the powers directly _ 
fronting on the river Agsane - a commission composed of representatives 
of the six nations, which was to be the permanent commission. In * 
the end the thing worked out so that the temporary commission became. 
the permanent commission and the permanent commission became the 
temporary commission, because this commission of the River jdiane pow- 
ers which was to be the permanent commission fought within itself so 
hétterly and was governed by such narrow and selfish considerations 
that is soon went to pieces, whereas the more truly international 
commission, which was able to riss to lurger and higher points of 
yiew, transcended its temporary powers and went on to build light- 
houses, and dredge river channels and make docks and remove wrecks 
and derelicts, etc., and has been functioning right up through a 

large part of the war itself, 


So that the true principle of internationalism is to bring 
in disinterested forces as well as the forces directly interested, 
and that would apply also in the case of the true internationalization 
of the city of Constantinople, 


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QUESTION 2 Do you mean to say that the present League of 
Nations draft has been affected by that book of Woolfs, Speers I 


q ‘ . . 
can t understand how that mandatory solution can come in in con+- 
nection with that international commission? 


DR. NASMYTH - No, Woolf didn't consider the questions 
of colonies and things of that kind with which the mandatory prin- 
ciple is concerned. Woolf's book on International Government pro- 
posed as a practical solution of the difficulty of applying the 
principle that all nations are equal - which is not true (Nicaragua 
and San Domingo’ are not as a matter of factt equal to the British 
Empire)- that friction of international law he proposed to solve by 
having one bedy in which all nations would have an equal vote and 
equal representation, and another body composed of representatives 
of great powers which would have practically everything to say about 
important decisions, His principles of the economic sanctions have 
been incorporated, It is remarkable to find them when you go through 
that Study of several years ago how much of it has been incorporated 
in the League of Nations treaty. He has a peculiarly practical mind © 
which sees solutions that are possible under the present conservative, 
more or less reactionary, governments, of the great powers, and that 
1S a ground for hoping that possibly an international government of 


Constantinople might be set up even as a result of the Peace Confer- 
ence. 


QUESTION - Will you tell me what the attitude of the Soviet 
system of government is toward artists and poets, ete. Is it true 
that they starve? Do they want all bricklayers? 


DR. NASMYTH ~- It is somewhat out of the realm of terri- 
torial adjustments, but the information that I have is that there has 
never been such a flourishing of the arts and literature and theatre 
and drama and all of the higher flowers of civilization as has 
Occurred under the Soviet government. 


QUESTION + You were mentioning the dissatisfaction about 
the German treatment of Bohemia and Slovakia - will you tell me why 
the system of education was more oppressive there than in the east? 
I can't understand why they should be oppressed in the west. 


DR. NASMYTH - It seemed to be a part of Austria's policy 
“to conciliate the Poles with the idea that when a united Poland should 
again arise, they would be in favor of being joined to the Austrian 
Empire, and the Poles in Galicia were certainly the most fortunate 

of all the three groups in the partition. A great conflict raged 
within the Austrian Empire over the solutjion of the Jugo-Slav problem, 
and the Arch-Duke who was assassinated was in favor of. the greatest 
degree of freedom and tcleranes and a joining of these Jugo-Slav 
people. He was in favor of what was called the "triolismus" (?) - 
the triple policy instead of the dual - a tiple kingdom of Jugo- 
Slavia, Hungary and austria, instead of the dual kingdom of Austria- 
Hungary with all the subject nationalities. 


| QUESTION - What proportion of the French people does 
Clemenceau's annexation policy represent? 


DR, NASMYTH - It represents the power of the Credit 
Layonaisse and the Rothschilds and the Jingo Press of Franct;- the 
avenues of public opinion are so completely in the power of the 
press that there is no way of getting at what public opinion really 
is. 


QUESTION - You mentioned the internetionalization of the 
railway groups or trade groups that do not depend upon seaports such 
as the contemplated road from England through France and under the. 
Gibralter down to the west coast of Africa, etc., and those other very 
essential new trade routes, such as the Bagdad railway, of course, 
but is it contemplated to have those vast international trade routes 
internationalized? 


QR NASLYTH - That is, of course, the only solution, unless 
you get removal of economic barriers and free trade, which is the 
ultimate sane policy. The only safe-guard there is that they have 
to practice the policy of the open door. As soon as they begin to 


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give preferential rates to their own commerce, they automatically make 
enemies of all the rest of the nations, and an empire like the British 
impire cannot afford to antagonize all the rest of the world, so that 
She has had no preferential tariffs in Egypt or India, and has had the 
principle of the open door, etc., and that would be one guarantee at 
least that these international routes even though they were under inter- 
national control would not bes preferential in their rates and treatment 


QUESTION - Is that Bordeaux - Bagdad railroad going to be 
built? Is it prospective or a fact? 


DR, NASMYTH - It is built with the exceptiotn of about two 
hundred miles in here. It would utilize existing lines running through 
vere, and it would depend upon the completion of that line in there, 
That would be only one route of course, If you get that link put in 

here would be a Berlin-Bagdad railroad as well as a Bordeaux-Bagdad 
riilroad, All of these will connect up and this new tunneling of the 
Pyrenees here together with the tunnel under the English Channel will 
help to bind ali Europe still closer together. So that if the govern- 
ments continue blind to the plain economic needs of that relatively 
limited territory there and continue to fight each other and practice 
the policy of economic isolation, and all the rest of the futilities 
of the protective system, something will break down in the near future, 
and those barriers will be swept away. 


QUESTION - I should think that there might be a great problem 
in regard to smuggling small ares? 


DR. NASMYTH - It was interesting to watch the solution that 
they tried to work out in the Mexican border between the United States 
and Mexico. There are hundreds of miles ~ thousands I guess - of 
desert area, and it ig impossible to put a soldier every ten feet and 
guard that area, What they do is to guard the railroad centers. The 
HlPaso railread and Sante F4 railroad that runs down through the 
southwest has its custom officials at every station along the line, 
and although there are a good many Ford automobiles that go across 
with as heavy loads as they can esrry, the theory is that ultimately 
they will have to come tc one of these freight stations for supplies 
or to deliver their smuggled goods,- and I presume the attempt will 
be made to control the air routes in the same way - by controlling the 
landing places. Whether it will be practicable or not is something 
ditficult to foresee. : 


The whole pressure is so irresistible towards the breaking 
down of those economic barriers, and the revenue obtained from it £68 
so infinitesimal compared with the needs of nations burdened with the 
huge war debts resulting from the past five years, that I think we 
shall see a great weakening.of the protective principle, and the very 
rapid growth of the federative crinciple towards a world custom union. 


QUESTION - I see that President Wilson is charged with being 
socialistic now, and before he was charged with being imperialistic. 
He can't please everybody -- 


DR. NASMYTH - I suppose that is the unfortunate position of 
a liberal. He is charged dy the reactionaries as being a wild radical 
and by the radicals. as being @ wild reactionary, and he gets around 
in between the upper and the nether mill-stone, 


QUESTION - Would the League of Nations if it were passed 
help to settle the question of whether the Japanese could settle in 
Mexico? Would that come under the League of Nations? 


DR.NASHYTH - I presume it would &s being a possible cause of 
war, if the League is going to deal with causes of WAT ual v seems to 
me that the only solution in the end is to have freedom of migration 
as we have among the states of the Union, if we get a real federation 
eventually, but in the present temper of the governments, that would 
undoubtedly be reserved as a domestic problem for the governments 
themselves to deal with. 


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QUESTION - You speak a good deal tonight about the erasure 
of boundary lines, I think we all feel very much in sympathy with that, 
but old-fashioned people seem to think that it is impossible, and I 
wonder why they should? I Spoke to a professor of international law 
a@ little while ago and said: "Why couldn't there have been a United 
States of Europe and of the world years ago?" And he said: "Their 
interests are so different; it. is impossible, “Ititen't a matter of’ 
Janguage; it is their interests." Well, of course, we see that the 
differences in Europe are much greater than the differences here, and 
yet our differences are also very great between the grapefruit of 
Jlorida and the wheat fields of Minnesota - the interests are very 
different, but it doesn't nake us two different nations. I can't see 
that the argument is sound, 


DR. NASLYTH - Diversity of interests is really a reason 
for union. The reason why the tendency toward a union between Germany 
and Russia is almost irresistible is because of the diversity of 
interests, - Russia - a great agricultural country with oil and 
minerals; Germany a great industrial country with locomotives and 
agricultural machinery, - each having the things that the other needs, 


That is the reason for their coming together and not for keeping them 
apart, 


The real reason in back of these people's minds who have 
been steeped in nationalism in our educational systems of the past 
is the reason given by Senator Lodge in a debate when he said: "I 
sm too old for a League of Nations," 


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